Cops use decoy to nab man accused of assaulting sleeping women in hotel

By Crimesider Staff

Updated on: October 11, 2016 / 12:57 PM
/ CBS/AP

MANASSAS, Va. -- A man accused of sneaking into hotel rooms and sexually assaulting his victims as they slept has been arrested following a sting operation in northern Virginia.

Prince William County police said Monday that 31-year-old Brandon C. Murdock of Front Royal was charged with burglary and attempted aggravated sexual assault.

Police believe Murdock entered rooms at the Wyndham Garden Hotel in Manassas and sexually assaulted a 63-year-old woman visiting from overseas in September and two teenage girls on a school-related trip from South Korea last October.

In both cases, the victims said they woke up to a man touching them inappropriately, but he fled.

Investigators placed a decoy in one of the hotel’s rooms Thursday. They say Murdock entered and was apprehended. A Prince William County police department spokesman told the Washington Post the decoy was not a real person.

Police told the paper there were no signs of forced entry into the women’s rooms. They did not say whether Murdock was an employee of the hotel.